9.26.2008

The Secret To A Long Life.............




When my grandmother turned 101 in July she gave an interview to the local Newspaper. She told them that the secret to a long and healthy life was keeping busy and not worrying.

She failed to add that she grew all her own food, never smoked, and didn't drink. I guess if you are busy going about your daily work you don't have time to get old. Daily work keeps you mentally active and physically active. It is funny how no one went to the gymnasium in 1940 ! doing a hard days work was just part of life.

Now..... advertising tells us that work or effort is bad. We drive 1 kilometre to the shop, we have a clicker button that changes the channels on the TV because, lets face it, we don't want to have to get up and take three steps! We are so sedentary because we have machines that do everything for us. As a result we are completely out of balance as human beings. We are overweight, take medication to reduce our cholesterol and more medication to keep our blood pressure down.

Maybe if we took the 1940s approach to life, things would fall back into balance. Walking to the shop, digging in the garden, growing and eating our own food would reduce our waistline, our blood pressure and our cholesterol levels. The work would give us a tremendous sense of satisfaction that money can't buy and the changes we make would improve our family budget.

Then we would be as humans are meant to be. Balanced. Are we the only mammal that is self destructive?

Hubbie snapped the photo a couple of days ago. It is entitled "why do you ask?"

4 comments:

libby said...

Humans are a VERY strange species aren't we? We know what is good for us and right thing to do but we do just the opposite. I think our commercialism and consumerism has a lot to answer for.

Libby

Tania said...

Love the photo!
This is so true, we do not work as hard as our parents or grandparents.

In my opinion we are a lazy generation always looking for things to make our life easier.

My grandmother died at the age of 92 and she worked hard and had very tough times. I have a lot of respect for her and my grandfather. They experienced hard life experiences to make my life better and easier.

gary said...

Busy Woman,

My wife and I read a book a few months ago in which the author extolled, among many other things, an hour of 'honest work' a day. He defines that as physical effort that achieves something tangible.

The more I reflect on that, the more I think he's right.

The book is Serve God, Save the Planet by Matthew Sleeth.

Regards, Gary

Anonymous said...

It is so true what you say, unfortunately it is so hard to change the habits that have been ingrained for so long.

Trying to make changes take time, but they are not impossible.

Thank you for sharing...

mari

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